The Rams’ relocation from St. Louis to Los Angeles wasn’t exactly a clean one. Their decision to leave the Midwest angered fans and government officials in St. Louis, stripping the city of its biggest sports franchise.
St. Louis filed a lawsuit against the Rams and owner Stan Kroenke, which was settled in 2021 for $790 million, $255 million of which is going to the city. This week, St. Louis mayor Cara Spencer signed a bill to allocate the $255 million in a variety of ways, helping the city a decade after the Rams left.
According to KSDK, $120 million of it will go to north St. Louis, most of it being for tornado relief. Another $55 million will help improve downtown and $80 million will go toward citywide infrastructure.
The bill, which the St. Louis Board of Aldermen approved earlier this month in a 12-3 vote, directs $120 million to north St. Louis, including $89 million for long-term tornado recovery; $80 million to citywide infrastructure; and $55 million to downtown revitalization.
The mayor’s office said $2.5 million would immediately be invested into north St. Louis to remove hazardous trees and dangerous stumps, and repairing sidewalks ineligible for Federal Emergency Management Agency reimbursement. The city said it was also transferring settlement funds, including $40 million to the city’s Water Division to immediately support essential infrastructure repairs.
By signing this bill, St. Louis hopes to put the loss of the Rams behind it, moving forward with funds that can help improve the city in a big way.
“Today is a long-awaited moment more than four years in the making,” Mayor Spencer said, via KSDK. “When the Rams left St. Louis, our community felt that loss. We felt it as sports fans. We felt it as taxpayers. We felt it in our infrastructure, in our economy and in the confidence of a city that deserved better. Today, we begin turning that page.”
The Rams moved to Los Angeles in 2016 and played at the Coliseum until 2019. SoFi Stadium opened in 2020, amid the COVID pandemic, with fans being welcomed to the stadium for the first time in 2021.
This article originally appeared on Rams Wire: St. Louis finalizes how it will use $255M from Rams relocation settlement
Reporting by Cameron DaSilva, Rams Wire / Rams Wire
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Cameron DaSilva, Rams Wire | USA TODAY Network
